Z E S Z Y T Y N A U K O W E UNIWERSYTETU RZESZOWSKIEGO SERIA FILOLOGICZNA ZESZYT 85 / 2014 STUDIA ANGLICA RESOVIENSIA 11

Donald TRINDER

University of Rzeszow [email protected]

THE INEVITABLE ERROR OF THE BRITISH GUARANTEE TO POLAND OF MARCH 1939: A REVISION1

Abstract: On 31st March, 1939, Neville Chamberlain announced to Parliament that a guarantee of territorial integrity had been extended to Poland. This single act more than any other can be seen as the main trigger for the outbreak of the Second World War. The ensuing article will discuss the main figures involved in ensuring that the guarantee came into being and the reasons behind the decision to extend the guarantee on behalf of the British Government. Also, the evolution of the historiography of the period will also be discussed in detail. It is intended to demonstrate that the guarantee, along with its logical implications and consequences, was the only option available for both parties, and by extension the government of , given the circumstances in March 1939 following the partition of Czechoslovakia.

Key Words: Anglo-Polish relations, Military Guarantee, Appeasement, Józef Beck, Neville Chamberlain

Introduction

On the 30th March, 1939 the first concrete step was taken on the road to global conflagration as British Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain, hand drafted a note which was to be presented to the Polish Ambassador in London, Edward Raczyński. The content of this note was an unconditional guarantee of the territorial integrity of the Second Republic of Poland against German aggression, and an open-ended promise to come to the aid of the Poles with the all the powers at the disposal of His

1 I would like to take the opportunity to thank Professor Kleparski for his guidance, advice and support during the writing of this work. The feedback has been invaluable and any errors, either factual or stylistic, remain of my own making.

213 Majesty’s Government. From that moment on, the guarantee has proven one of the most divisive questions when one examines the of Anglo-Polish relations. The British traditionally saw this as a move to try to restrain Hitler, and possibly to allow London to exert some influence on Poland when it came to negotiations over Gdansk. The Polish view has traditionally propounded the notion that Britain extended a guarantee that they had no intention of fulfilling, which led to the formulation of the Great Betrayal thesis.2 It is the aim set to this paper to attempt to demonstrate that these two intractable and contradictory views can be interwoven to produce a synthetic view of the Guarantee which overhauls any interpretation which tends towards the fact that this was erroneous for either side. Indeed, after examining the evolution of the British historiographical tradition, a discussion of the English and Polish views of the time will be presented, before the conclusion is propounded that this Guarantee was, in fact, the best (arguably only) solution to the dissolution of Czecho-Slovakia in March 1939.

The British Historiographical Tradition

With the high levels of state control of the press which were implemented at the outbreak of World War II, it seems somewhat surprising that one of the most influential and, at the same time, provocative pieces of historical work on the subject of the appeasement of Hitler was actually published in July 1940, barely a month after the evacuation of Dunkirk and two weeks after the Franco-German Armistice resulted in the creation of the Vichy Republic and the effective isolation of Britain in the War. The anonymously published pamphlet entitled Guilty Men was a hostile critique of the continual appeasement of the Nazi regime throughout the 1930s and the complete lack of readiness of the British military to cope with the impending danger. Originally published under the pen name Cato, the three journalists3 (who were incidentally employees of the powerful media magnate and Conservative Party supporter Lord Beaverbrook) clearly placed the blame for the disaster of 1940, and the War in general, squarely at the feet of successive governments, and they did not shirk from naming and shaming specific individuals, including all three Prime Ministers from the 1930s (Ramsay MacDonald, Stanley Baldwin and Neville Chamberlain). Despite the fact that the pamphlet was not handled by any of the main book retailers of the time, over 200, 000 copies were sold by the middle of August. This hurriedly produced manuscript (the total time

2 For more on the British perspective, see Taylor (1976) and Carr (1990) among others; while a representative view of the Polish perspective is offered in Roszkowski (2002). 3 Michael Foot, Peter Howard and Frank Owen, who represented a broad political spectrum at the time (Labour, Conservative and Liberal).

214 of writing was four days and pre-publication editing and preparation for press totalled four weeks), which was strewn with errors and factual inaccuracies, was to shape the way that British historians viewed the causes of the War up until the 1960s. Cato’s view was reinforced and upheld by the monumental publication of the British Wartime Prime Minister, who in 1948 published the first part of his six volume history of the conflict. The Gathering Storm reinforced three key elements of British historiographical thinking at the time: the treaty of Versailles was the key underlying factor in the creation of internal German tension, and allowed the breeding ground for the spread of Nazism; the Appeasers were naïve and incompetent in allowing Hitler to rearm the German nation and expand at will without tangible consequences; and finally that Hitler, in pursuing the policies which he had laid out in , was responsible with his small retinue of loyal supporters for steering Europe inexorably along the path to War. The most common criticism of The Gathering Storm today is that it represents more of a memoir rather than serious piece of historical writing. Extreme critics even view it as nothing further than pretentious self-aggrandisement on behalf of Churchill. Regardless of the modern interpretations, this does remain as a prototypical example of the accepted view of History from 1940s and 50s. A more scholarly approach is ascribed to Alan Bullock, whose groundbreaking Hitler: A Study in Tyranny (1952) was the first full scale biography of Hitler to be published anywhere in the world. In this, Bullock indicated that Hitler was not an evil genius who had plotted the downfall of the world, but was rather an opportunist who was bullied into increasingly radical and reprehensible forms of action by his intriguing henchmen. Thus, the traditionalist approach to the Causes of World War Two placed the blame for the outbreak of hostilities firmly and squarely at the feet of the British political establishment. Of course, there was equal blame apportioned to the imperialist nature of the Nazis and Adolph Hitler in specific, but a surprising amount of attention was devoted to why the British had failed to act, and take preventive measures prior to the invasion of Poland in September 1939. This entire view was challenged by the eminent Oxford historian A.J.P. Taylor, who in 1961 published his highly controversial The Origins of the Second World War. As the pioneer of the revisionist approach to the inter-War period, Taylor sought to strike a balanced and objective view of the events of the 1930s. While he remained consistent in the view that Versailles was the ultimate cause of all later evils,4 Taylor differed from the accepted view of history in two key areas. His first ‘revision’ was connected with the controversial policy of Appeasement: Taylor saw this as a logical approach to relations with Germany and, given the depleted nature of the British military, he suggested that there was no other feasible course

4 This thesis is commonly referred to as the ‘Thirty Years War’, which was first suggested by German political Scientist Sigmund Neumann in 1946, before achieving wide public recognition when Churchill made reference to the idea in the introduction to The Gathering Storm.

215 of action. Secondly, and somewhat more provocatively, Taylor insisted that Hitler was not a rabid war-monger, but rather represented a coherent continuation of the German imperial policy first propounded by Otto von Bismarck and Kaiser Wilhelm II. Taylor did, however, remain consistent with the views of Bullock in portraying Hitler as a haphazard opportunist who simply took advantage of situations as they arose, rather than operating according to a grand plan.5 The work of Taylor provoked fierce criticism, with hostile reviews being published in the Times Literary Supplement within days of the books original publication, but Taylor was not without his supporters, most notably E.H. Carr, who published a number of articles proclaiming the value of the general thesis of Taylor and also the impeccable logic of the work as a whole.6 Since then, the debate has focussed on two main areas, the first of which being the level to which the British Government had been somehow complicit in the events which led up to the outbreak of the Second World War. The second area of debate encompassed a truly international flavour, with historians of many nations seeking to add their voice to the conflict. The basic question revolves around something which was first noticed as a point of divergence between two distinguished British scholars, the aforementioned Bullock and Hugh Trevor-Roper. The question was extremely simple: was Hitler a man in charge of his own destiny, and consequently operating according to a fixed plan or agenda, or was he an opportunist who was able to take advantage of a succession of international mishaps? The debate is now termed as the Intentionalist/Functionalist debate, with Trevor-Roper standing for the former, while Bullock and Taylor provide pioneering examples of the latter approach.7 In the late 1960s the debate was enriched by the heavyweight contribution of German historian Martin Broszat who argued in an eloquent and persuasive manner that Hitler’s lack of clarity of purpose is best illustrated by the developing crisis of 1939, and that his failure to present a coherent policy towards Poland clearly indicates a lack of overall policy. The reason being was that if Hitler really had desired as his ultimate goal Lebensraum in the east, a clear way to deal with Poland was a condicio sine qua non of any further expansion. Another German to present the functionalist view was , who in a series of articles and publications established a coherent overview of the Nazi state which became known as the so-called ‘Weak Dictator’ thesis. In this, Mommsen argued that Hitler was a powerful demagogue who incited fury and hatred in his audience, but always distanced himself from the decision making process because of an inherent indecisiveness and that he was often wracked by dithering and uncertainty. The Intentionalist school was initially represented by Churchill and Trevor- Roper, who both used a similar line of argumentation in that Hitler had effectively

5 Often referred to the Stufenplan Thesis. For more on this subject see Andreas Hillgruber (1965, 1969). 6 For a full account of the controversy provoked by Taylor’s work, see Burk (2000). 7 The issue is fully expounded upon in Kershaw (1993).

216 laid out a ‘roadmap’ for conquest and imperialist expansion in Mein Kampf, and that everything he did was attuned to this end. Of course, as German historians entered the debate, the Intentionalist school received a major intellectual boost from the likes of the aforementioned Hillgruber and Klaus Hidebrand (1979) who propounded the view that Hitler was working to a three stage Stufenplan, by which he wished to achieve Lebensraum in the east, followed by racial supremacy and then a challenge to American global supremacy. The idea was that even if Hitler did not dictate each individual event which unfolded, his overriding aims helped to shape any German response, and that within the apparatus of the Nazi Party itself Hitler was the provider of inspiration as well as the lead animator. Hillgruber, writing in 1974, went further to become one of the first historians to make reference to the unpublished manuscript of 1928 entitled Zweites Buch,8 dictated by Hitler following his failure in the 1928 General Election. The evidence for an Intentionalist view has grown over the years, with such things as the Z Plan9 being cited as clear evidence of a long term view to achieve global domination. There was an additional element to this debate, with many historians questioning the extent of Hitler’s ambition, but as this is of little relevance to the current discussion, it shall be passed over.10 As with all major disputes, the modern school of thought tends towards a selective synthesis of the conflicting points of view, which is best summed up by the main work of British historian (1993), who is able to offer a unique perspective because of his Anglo-German academic development in the 1970s. In his work on the Nazi Dictatorship, Kershaw seeks to define a clear middle path between opposing views in order to create a balanced and universally acceptable insight into the workings of the Nazi regime. In terms of foreign policy, Kershaw indicates that Hitler did have some preconceived plans as to what he wished to achieve, such as a mutual alliance with the British aligned against the . When such overtures were rebuffed, Hitler followed an ad hoc policy which saw him jump from crisis to crisis until the eventual outbreak of war in 1939, with an alignment which was diametrically opposed to his original intentions. Thus, from a modern perspective, it should be stated that Hitler’s weltanschauung was the prime motivator in the direction of German foreign policy throughout the period 1933 to 1945, but the very nature of international relations meant that there had also to be a certain element of spontaneity and elasticity in foreign policy as events, both

8 This ‘Second Book’ was dictated by Hitler in order to try to clarify his overall aims to the German people, whom he feared greatly misunderstood the nature of his grand plans. It was never to see the light of day because Hitler’s publishers felt that the publication of a second book would hinder the already lacklustre sales of Mein Kampf. 9 The Z Plan was a German programme of rapid and advanced naval expansion, by which Hitler hoped to be able to construct a sufficiently powerful naval force to defeat the British Royal Navy, thus giving him command of the sea and allowing for global territorial expansion. 10 The debate is mainly referred to as the ‘Continentalist vs. Globalist’ debate.

217 internal and external, were unpredictable. There has also been a number of attempts in the British historiographical tradition to look beyond personalities, one of the most notable being the ‘Flight Into War’ theory propounded by Timothy Mason. In this, Mason argued that the Nazi state was actually subject to control by the workers, who could easily hold employers to ransom in their demand for better wages. Equally, there was a growing differential between supply and demand as the production targets set in the Four Year Plan squeezed already scant natural resources almost to the point of exhaustion. The resulting economic stress forced the Nazi regime to seek a way out of the rapidly developing economic crisis in the only way possible – war. This view was refuted by , among others, who saw the economic difficulties of in 1939 as being of no more serious nature than previous difficulties and that the invasion of Poland was in no way related to economic pressure, which Hitler was in all probability unaware of because of the control of information in and out of the Presidential office, indeed Overy cited the lack of documentary evidence regarding economic discussions as being the biggest single flaw in the argumentation of Mason. In addition, a number of documents emerged from within the German Civil Service, which clearly indicated that the strain being placed on natural resources was more of an incentive to find innovative long term solutions than to launch an armed robbery of a neighbouring nation state. When we turn our attention to Britain and the economic arguments, R.A.C. Parker used a slightly less quantitative approach when stressing the business background of Neville Chamberlain as being the overriding motivation of the Prime Minister to seek the avoidance of war ‘at all costs’. There have been a number of other attempts at quantitative analyses of the causes of the war, but they all tend to fall behind the basic notion of big politics, and with it big personalities.

A bi-focal view of the British guarantee

Moving on to the meat of the issue, we shall now turn our attention the Spring of 1939 in order to draw a synthetic picture of the Guarantee of Poland which was extended by the British Government on 30th March. Here the British and Polish viewpoints on the matter will be juxtaposed in order to attempt to create a synthetic understanding. Given the limitations of space, a full treatment of the subject is impossible, so only the key questions will be addressed. To begin from the Polish point of view, the period between the rise of the Nazi Party and the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia can be seen within the framework of a coherent strategy. Were we to be discussing the Cold War, we might refer to a policy of Non-Alignment,11 for Polish Foreign Minister Józef Beck studiously

11 This was the term coined to define the diplomatic approach of nations such as India or Egypt to the Cold War superpowers, whereby they sought to avoid becoming entangled in either camp.

218 sought to maintain a strict neutrality and equal friendship between Nazi Germany on the one side and Soviet Russia on the other. The non-aggression pact with Germany that had been signed in 1934 was still in effect, and new trade agreements had been concluded with the Kremlin as late as February 1939. The problem for Beck was that Poland had been subject to intolerable pressure from the German Foreign Ministry since the previous November, and the subject of that pressure was the Polish Corridor and the sovereignty of the city of Gdansk. Clearly, it would have been akin to political suicide to bow down to the Nazi territorial demands, but it was equally unacceptable to the Polish electorate to countenance any type of pact with Stalin.12 The sense of isolation was accentuated by dint of the fact that the Munich Agreement of September 1939 sent a clear signal to the nations of central Europe that Britain and France were ambivalent towards maintaining any form of status quo. Thus, for Beck there were three options on the table prior to the end of March 1939. The first of these involved giving in to the excessive pressure from Germany and joining the Anti-Comintern Pact; which would consequently mean Poland become directly aligned against the Soviet Union. This would have a number of very nasty catches as, primarily, it would entail the cession of territory to the Nazis, and bring closer the prospect of Poland becoming embroiled in a direct conflict with the Soviet Union. This solution would have been unacceptable to both the Polish political elite and the electorate at large. Turning east, the second option was to align directly with the Soviet Union, and Joseph Stalin. This would have been equally unacceptable because it would have placed Poland in direct opposition to Germany. It would also have been close to impossible to achieve as Stalin had an avowed hatred of Poland, and would have taken great delight in being able to reabsorb former territory which had been lost during the Polish War of Independence (a defeat which still rankled with the Communist Party Secretary). The third way which was open to Beck was to maintain Poland’s perilous state of neutrality. This path would have been more viable had Poland been militarily much stronger, or if Poland had the backing of a strong third power, such as Great Britain. Munich shattered the possibility of the latter, and the former could only be achieved with huge financial investment which was only possible through loans.13 When faced with this form of Hobson’s Choice, the outcome was obvious. Poland continued along the path which had been set out way back in 1933: to walk the tightrope between Fascism and Communism and pray for deliverance.14 The British arrived at the beginning of 1939 under the delusion that they had saved the peace of Europe and could finally get down to the task of generating a golden age of prosperity. This was the dream of the British Prime Minister,

12 Indeed, here one might speculate with certainty that Stalin was not at all interested in close cooperation with Poland. 13 Securable with the backing of a great power such as Britain. 14 This question is fully developed by Davies (1981).

219 Neville Chamberlain, for whom the idea of war was anathema. Chamberlain was a businessman at heart, and the ruinous cost of the First World War, both in human and economic terms, was something to be avoided at all costs. One of the keys to British prosperity was held to be a strong and stable Germany, and Hitler was viewed by the majority as being the man to restore former glories to the Reich. Thus, when Hitler spoke of rectifying the wrongs of Versailles and restoring pride in Germany, he was actually reflecting the views of Britain’s political leadership. One additional factor, which needs to be taken into consideration when assessing the British policy of Appeasement,15 is the fact that the British military had been cut back systematically following the end of hostilities in 1918. In 1919, the year following the First World War, when Britain was still involved in conflicts in Russia, Ireland, Afghanistan and Turkey there were over 1.6 million military personnel maintained at a crippling cost of 40% of GDP. This was rapidly reduced further so that by 1923, there were just 334,000 men under arms in defence of the British Empire at a cost of 2.9% of GDP. This was run down even further over the next 12 years to an inter-war low of just over 2.5% of GDP in 1935. At this point we can chart a reverse of the trend, which saw the slow rearmament of and reinvestment in the military so that at the end of 1938there were 384,800 men under arms and the defence budget had increased to 3.74% of GDP. What we can infer from this data is that the British Military was in absolutely no shape to start a war, even on a defensive scale in 1938. The RAF was underfunded and the much vaunted Radar Chain for Coastal Command was incomplete. The Royal Navy was in the middle of an extensive refit and overhaul, while the Army was undermanned and underequipped for modern mobile warfare. This is the main reason why Chamberlain was forced into a defensive position in 1938. In the Spring of 1939 there had been no improvement in either the material or financial situation, but the mood of the public had shifted significantly. When Czechoslovakia vanished, the resolve of the British public hardened, forcing the Government into action. As direct intervention to save the doomed state was senseless, the British turned their attention to Hitler’s next prize: Poland. In practical terms, however, there was very little that the British were able to do. Sending ships from the Royal Navy would have been a senseless waste of resources; there were insufficient planes available to give to the Poles without endangering Britain’s frail defensive network; and there was no materiel available to bolster the Polish land forces. The only realistic help that the British government were able to offer with relatively immediate effect were secured defence loans, which required the authority of Parliament to extend as there was no state of war. This brings us to question why the guarantee was offered if the British had no way of enforcing it in a military sense. Some have suggested that the French

15 This was the policy, whereby Britain, and France as her ally, sought to avoid war with the Fascist powers by acceding to their demands.

220 would be able to offer assistance to Poland in the event of war by immediately opening up a second front. This thesis, however, is overly generous towards French military capabilities in 1939: indeed, the French army was even more antiquated and under equipped than that of the British. The French had invested heavily in the Maginot Line, which indicated the clearly defensive posture of their military. It was much smaller than the German Military, and the French were well aware of the fact that they would have to rely heavily on British field support in order to be able to conduct offensive operations. So if no help were to be forthcoming in the event of a Nazi invasion, there must be another solution to this conundrum. In fact, the answer can be found in notes from the Anglo-French military discussions of June 1939, in which both parties made it quite clear that they would be incapable of assisting Poland. In fact, Poland’s fate would be decided only when Germany were defeated by the combined allied powers. This is because of the extended time it would take to transfer from a peace to a war footing, allowing for the full mobilisation of the two nations. From a western perspective, the guarantee makes logical sense. It acted as a proverbial ‘line in the sand’ by which either the Germans would have been deterred from their hostile course of action, or the allies would have their justifiable casus belli, and the time to implement their war plans. This is all well and good, but it fails to explain how this guarantee was in any way beneficial to the Polish government or people. Superficially, it would appear that the guarantee offered nothing at all for Poland, a fact about which the government of Ignacy Mościcki must have been well aware. For the Polish government, it was nothing short of a justification of their path to that moment. Finally, their prayers had been answered and the support of the western nations was finally forthcoming. In simple terms, the guarantee offered Beck a way out of the painful question of alignment with one of the former partitioning powers. This is reflected in his almost triumphal speech to the Polish Sejm on 5th April, 1939, which is here quoted after Roszkowski (2002: 89): [...] My w Polsce nie znamy pojęcia pokoju za wszelką cenę. Jest jedna tylko rzecz w życiu ludzi, narodów i państw, któta jest bezcenna. Tą rzeczą jest honor […].16 This tiny quote helps us to clarify the real Polish attitude. Despite the empty Anglo-French promises of aid and intervention in the event of war, the real value of the guarantee was that it ended the Polish sense of diplomatic isolation, and emboldened Józef Beck to embark on a tough negotiating line when it came to German aggression. In his heart of hearts Beck must have known that Poland was doomed; the geographical situation almost ensured that before a shot was fired. The fact is, however, that Poland was not, as it had been in the second half of the eighteenth century, isolated and the hope must have been that the war against

16 […] We in Poland know nothing of the notion of peace at any price. There is only one thing in the life of people, nations and countries which is priceless. That thing is honour[…]. [translation my own].

221 Germany would be won in the long term, rather than a quick victory. This forward- thinking is best reflected in a conversation which took place between the Italian Foreign Minister, Count Ciano, and the Polish Ambassador in , General Wieniawa-Długoszowski, which were reported in the diaries of Ciano, here quoted from Davis (1981: 432):

[…] I urged him [Wieniawa] to show the greatest moderation. Whatever will happen, Poland will pay the cost of the conflict. No Franco-British assistance will be forthcoming, at least, not in the first phase of the war; and Poland would be quickly turned into a heap of ruins. Wieniawa admits that I am right on many points, but believes in some eventual success that might give Poland greater strength. Alas, I fear that many, too many, Poles share his illusions […].

Concluding remarks

It was the intention set to this paper to attempt to display as decisively as possible that the much maligned guarantee of Polish independence was the best possible outcome for both the British and the Polish. The limitations of space here prevent a full discussion of either the events or the historiography, but the tentative conclusion that can be drawn here is that the British needed to offer Poland a guarantee to attempt to fend off the imminent prospect of war. The best way to achieve that in the eyes of Chamberlain was to present Hitler with a greater threat than that posed by Poland in isolation. The Polish government, on the other hand, accepted the guarantee in order to allow the policy of isolation to continue, and also to avoid having to cave in to German territorial demands. Thus, we can see quite clearly that for starkly contrasting reasons, cooperation was the optimal way forward. Despite the misgivings of many people both then and now, the guarantee was the only solution to the pending crisis, and the right solution.

References

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222 Kershaw, I. 1993. The Nazi Dictatorship: Problems and Perspectives of Interpretation. London: Edward Arnold Press. Mason, T. 1981. “Intention and Explanation” [in:] Hirschfeld and Lothar (eds) Der ‘Fuhrerstaat’: Mythos und Realitat. Stuttgart: 23-40. Overy, R. 1982. “Hitler’s War and the German Economy” [in:] Economic History Review Vol. 35. pp. 272-291. Parker, R.A.C 1993. Chamberlain and Appeasement. London: Macmillan. Roszkowski, W. 2002. Historia Polski 1914-2001. Warszawa: PWN Taylor, A.J.P. 1976. The Origins of the Second World War. London: Penguin Books. Taylor, A.J.P. 1992. English History 1914-1945. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Trevor Roper, H. 2012. The Last Days of Hitler. London: Pan Umbridge.

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